BMW is about to take advantage of Mercedes-Benz and Lexus, advertising its hitherto unpromoted free maintenance for the first four years of ownership. The company has unleashed a major ad push behind the program known as BMW Ultimate Service, and the ensuing advertising battle should be entertaining.
BMW's ads, done by Kirshenbaum Bond Senecal + Partners, which took BMW's whole ad account assignment last August, are set inside a BMW dealership and draw on comedy to depict the incredulity that four years of free maintenance comes with every new BMW. In one spot, a woman thinks that the program is a come-on, and reminds the salesman that she is married. In another, a man buying a BMW thinks he has to give the salesman sports tickets in order to get the deal.
BMW's marketing chief Dan Creed says the ad campaign, for which there are 27 different possible endings to the vignettes, is timed right for luxury buyers, who, though seemingly fully recovered from the economic death march of 2008-2010, are still looking for value.
"The expectation and widely held belief that BMW has very expensive maintenance costs is still a big factor in why people bypass us when shopping, and we think we have a very efficient way of changing that perception here," says Creed. "Mercedes, Lexus, and our other competitors don't have this, and we are going to use it as a meaningful point of difference."––Paul Duchene
Check out the ads on YouTube:
BMW Ultimate Service -- Married
BMW Ultimate Service -- Tickets
